In the Jungle, the mighty Jungle..

Right then, after the Caribbean exuberance of Venezuala, and the European austerity of Santiago, it was time to stop arsing about, and get into the REAL South America.. you know; towering Andean mountains, barren plains at dizzying altitudes plunging down to the Amazonian basin and the sultry, sweaty jungle below, Indigenous Indian women with toothless, weather beaten faces, an ill fitting bowler hat and a small child wrapped in a colourful shaw, lllamas, excitable locals who will throw a stike/carnival/fiesta at the drop of a hat, and panpipes.. Oh, the panpipes.. so anyway.. you will find all these things in Bolivia.

Arriving in La Paz is spectacular.. a barren plain at over 4000m means you can feel dizzy stepping off the plane, and standing up quickly leaves you light headed.. this plain opens out into a steeply decending canyon, and La Paz is nestled in the middle of it´s steep, but densely polulated sides..
This is S.Americas poorest country, and it shows... the street stalls are full of women in their traditional dress, and there are plenty of beggars, and shoe shiners (bizarrely with their faces covered..apparently to hide the "shame" of cleaning shoes to support their family, but making them look like some kind of leather cleansing Al Queda sect). La Paz is also a real travellers centre on the "Gringo Trail", so the tourist is well catered for. After a couple of days, We booked our flights to the jungle town of Rurrenabeque, a 3 day trip to see wildlife, and headed off to the amazon basin.

Rurrenabeque is a hot, sleepy town that is geared entirely to travellers. After our first night in the hippy hangout of the "Mosquito Bar", we set off with blurry heads the next morning to the Pampas. Now this name conjurs up images of Argentine grasslands, but in this context, it is used to describe the area north of Rurrenabeque, which is basically marshy wetlands, intersected by shallow rivers. As we headed off on our boat, we saw loads of wildlife, alligators, pink fresh water dolphins, which we swam with, strange giant guinea pig like things, tortoises, and loads of amazingly colourful birdlife. Oh, and a load of pirate squirrel monkeys who invaded our boat armed with cutlasses and little pirate hats in the search of food.. (ok, a bit of an exaggeration). By night, after a moonlight boat trip, and a game of footy with the guides, we stayed in a basic, river side camp, which was ok, apart from the rowdy bunch of Israeli travellers keeping everyone up..
The next day we went out, saw an Anaconda (albeit a small one), swam with the dolphins, and went piranha fishing. (I goyt 2, and they taste a bit like cod). I also managed to get over a 100 mosquito bites, which wasnt so good.
The next day, after a dawn walk to spot howler monkeys, we had our long jouney back down the river to Rurre.
After another night out at the Mosquito Bar, we had a day of relaxation by the swimming pool, and then went out again to the wilderness - this time into the jungle proper.

The jungle was very different to our pampas trip - less wildlife to see, since they can hear you coming a mile off. But it´s a great experience, just the sounds, smells and bugs that fly around you make it worth a visit. We tracked a family of wild boar, went for a night walk where we saw some seriously big spiders, an armadillo, and an ocelot (think of a leopard the size of a cat). Apparently to see the really cool stuff, like jaguars etc, you need to spend at least a week there, and we just didnt have time.. We also learnt lots of cool things about the plants and insects in the jungle. Our guide, a native indian told us about Devil Ants, which can kill a man (yep, killer ants.. aparently 50 bites can kill you), we also learned how they get fresh water from certain leaves and vines, how they use various barks and saps as medicine, and one curious tree where the bark is a serious irritant, and can make you very ill.. the only cure for this is human urine. As interesting as this was, I couldnt help think about exactly HOW this discovery was made...
"Medicine Man.. me have umm big rash on my arm." "have you tried all the leaves, ant spit, and armadillo dung treatments on offer?" "yes, they work not" "hmm... ok, well lets think out of the box here..." and so on..

Again, we had a basic camp, but the food was good, and we had a really good time there for 3 days, and could have stayed longer..
And so we returned to Rurre, for another night in the Mosquito Bar.. (Honestly, it´s the only place in town). And then back to the cold air of La Paz, where the gas miners where on strike, setting off dynamite in the main plazas, and basically sealing off the city. Bolivians take their civil action seriously, and we´ve seen 3 or 4 massive demonstrations in La Paz. The spirit of Che Guavara (who died in Bolivia) lives large with the poor of this country. Anyway, enough politics. Despite this strike stopping all local bus services, I managed to book my activities for the next 2 weeks, which involve a detour to Cusco, clmbing a pretty big mountain, and visiting Bolivia's famed salt plains.
As my bus took me through the barren, and almost inhospitably high plains north of La Paz, towards the sacred Lake Titikaka, I found myself looking forward to the 6´th country on my trip.. Peru.

---

---